Rastan (archaeological site)
Coordinates: 34 ° 55 ′ 0 ″ N , 36 ° 44 ′ 0 ″ E
Rastan is an ancient Paleolithic site near the eponymous city of Rastan in northwest Syria . It lies above the Orontes , which forms a deep ravine at this point, halfway between Hama and Homs . Some of the stone finds have been dated to at least 370,000 years, possibly they are up to 700,000 years old, at least less than 800,000 years old.
At the beginning of the 1960s, the soil scientist Willem J. Van Liere , who worked for the FAO , collected a few deductions , but without specifying where he had done this. According to his description, they were exposed when the road to the Rastan Reservoir was built, which was built between 1958 and 1960. His description also reveals that the site was near two bridges that cross the river, so the artifacts were discovered on both sides of the Orontes on high river terraces. In a survey in 1977, 153 tees and cores were added , probably from the same areas , but the characterizations of the sites contradict one another. The artifacts probably came from a time between MIS 16 and MIS 11, which brings us to the time between about 700,000 and 424,000 before today. In a publication from 2008, the age of the site is given as 660,000 to 620,000 years. They are in the National Museum of Damascus .
In 2008, 132 artifacts were identified in the preparation of a dissertation , of which 76 were tees and 56 were cores. There were no hand axes, but a raw rubble tool (pebble tool), which could also be interpreted as the core. Of the cores alone, 23 were heavily worn, and 37 of the tees. This and other criteria led to the assumption that all the finds had been transported through the river over a long period of time and had been worn away in the process. A little more than 9% of the artifacts, however, showed no abrasion whatsoever, another 20% only minor ones. Probably this part of the assemblage was not subjected to the same abrasive forces.
The cores measured up to 120.7 mm and weighed between 15 and 915 g. However, the average values were only 62.1 mm and 171.9 g. This limited the editing options due to the size. The reductions are without exception the products of a hard hammer blow reduction, i.e. a very simple technique. No retouching was found. In addition, there are no flint stores in the area of the river.
The choice of materials, processing techniques and the lack of hand axes can easily be explained by the lack of suitable starting material for more complex products. Therefore, due to the mere absence of stone tools of mode 2, a simplistic classification of the site is forbidden, for example on the assumption that the hominids of Rastan would not have been able to produce mode 2 tools such as the hand ax, but only those of mode 1 ( Oldowan ).
literature
- Andrew Douglas Shaw: The Earlier Palaeolithic of Syria: Settlement History, Technology and Landscape-use in the Orontes and Euphrates Valleys , PhD, University of Durham, 2008, pp. 57-65.
- Jacques Besançon, Lorraine Copeland , Francis Hours, Paul Sanlaville: Morphologie et préhistoire de la vallée de l'Oronte entre Rastan et le Ghab (Syrie). Comptes Rendus de l'Académie des Sciences de Paris 287 (1978) 857-860.
Remarks
- ^ Andrew Douglas Shaw: The Earlier Palaeolithic of Syria. Reinvestigating the Evidence from the Orontes and Euphrates Valleys , Oxford 2012, p. 22.
- ↑ Andrew Douglas Shaw: The Earlier Palaeolithic of Syria: Settlement History, Technology and Landscape-use in the Orontes and Euphrates Valleys , PhD, University of Durham, 2008, Tab. 4.3.1, p. 49. Elsewhere (Tab. 10.3.1, p. 332) the author states "<0.66-> 0.37", the age was between 660,000 and 370,000 before today.
- ^ Andrew Douglas Shaw: The Earlier Palaeolithic of Syria: Settlement History, Technology and Landscape-use in the Orontes and Euphrates Valleys , PhD, University of Durham, 2008, p. 60.
- ↑ Andrew Douglas Shaw: The Earlier Palaeolithic of Syria: Settlement History, Technology and Landscape-use in the Orontes and Euphrates Valleys , PhD, University of Durham, 2008, p. 325 f.